Norwegian shipbuilder Vard Holdings Ltd (VARD) posted a 30.1 per cent year‐on‐year decline in first‐quarter net profit.Net profit for the three months ended March 31, 2013 fell to 188 million Norwegian kroner(S$40.1million) from 269 million kroner a year ago.

VARD attributed the decline in profit to exceptional profits from some older projects in Q1 2012, low utilisation at its shipyard in Vietnam, and an overloaded Niterói yard in Brazil.

The company said it was focusing on securing new Vietnam orders and implementing measures to improve the yard's long‐term capabilities. It expects its Brazilian operations to stabilise by end‐2013 as a result of a revised delivery schedule and a declining workload from delivering vessels. That said, it reckons the Brazilian
business will continue to be a drag on group performance until delivery of the last vessel in the current order book.

VARD said its order intake in Q1 was 2.8 billion kroner, more than double the 1.3 billion kroner in Q4 2012 and up almost 20 per cent from the same period a year ago. Taking into account the five vessels delivered during the quarter, VARD's order book comprised 46 vessels as of end‐March. Its order book stood at 15.5 billion kroner, up slightly from end‐December. It said its yards in Romania and Norway are operating at full gear, even though the yard in Vietnam was seeing lower utilisation. The company also revealed that its new shipyard in Brazil, Vard Promar, was more than 85 per cent completed and on track to start operations in end‐June this year. Said CEO Roy Reite: "We anticipate that the subsea construction vessel segment will continue to drive our growth this year, and we are confident about the group's prospects for new orders for the rest of 2013."

Source: AmFraser